It must be said that I am a good girl. One month before I received my permit and a week before the opening of the second trapping season, I received a call from my work that a hawk was stuck in a building. It had been there for 5 days, and they needed help to get it out. I went out and successfully caught the bird that had flown through a window and been stuck in a small chamber since. (They thought some kid had thrown a ball through the window). The bird was a gorgeous, huge immature female red-tail, just what I would be looking for in a month. Sigh. I let her go and tried not to think of how cool it could have been to have taken her home especially later when it was coming down to the wire and I was wondering if I'd even get a bird this season.
It was three days before the end of the trapping season. Permit freshly in hand, I begged the day off work knowing that the weather forecast for the two days after looked grim. I woke up early and met my sponsor Rudy. We drove up to a place where Rudy had trapped red-tails before. I was relying on his experience because I rarely see red-tails, and when I do, they are usually adults. It was a foggy morning and the first bird we ran across was a dead first year red-tail in the road. My sponsor laughed and said, "that was your bird!" I collected it anyhow hoping that we'd catch a live one and I'd be able to use the feathers off of this one in case we broke some in trapping the live one. More on that later
We arrived to the place where Rudy thought there would be a lot of red-tails, and he was right, I’d never seen so many in one place, and I look… believe me! The first one we saw was a big immature female, but she flushed the wrong direction and wasn't interested in our gerbils. The second bird we saw was sitting on a power pole. Rudy caught sight of her first. We got close to her and threw his trap out of the car. We headed down the road a ways while we waited and then spotted two other birds. Before we could get turned around however, the bird on the power pole came down to the trap, was that ever thrilling to watch! We pulled off and watched her foot the trap again and again for almost 5 minutes (those poor gerbils!). She just wasn't getting caught. Finally she started to jerk her foot erratically. We figured she had finally caught a loop. Thinking this was our chance we moved in and before we could reach her, she took off, knocking the trap over in the process.
Luckily, she landed nearby in a tree; she was keen on those gerbils. So, since she had fouled up (no pun intended) the other trap, I threw mine out there. I had spent about 8 hours building and setting loops on this trap, it had probably close to 150 loops on there. We drove down the road again and put Rudy's trap out on another young bird and by the time we turned around our first bird had nailed my trap! It was incredible! I grabbed a towel and ran over to her to restrain her... oh she was caught really good! She had at least 8 loops around her feet, she wasn’t going anywhere! We collected her, hooded her wrapped her in a towel and took her home!
It was three days before the end of the trapping season. Permit freshly in hand, I begged the day off work knowing that the weather forecast for the two days after looked grim. I woke up early and met my sponsor Rudy. We drove up to a place where Rudy had trapped red-tails before. I was relying on his experience because I rarely see red-tails, and when I do, they are usually adults. It was a foggy morning and the first bird we ran across was a dead first year red-tail in the road. My sponsor laughed and said, "that was your bird!" I collected it anyhow hoping that we'd catch a live one and I'd be able to use the feathers off of this one in case we broke some in trapping the live one. More on that later
We arrived to the place where Rudy thought there would be a lot of red-tails, and he was right, I’d never seen so many in one place, and I look… believe me! The first one we saw was a big immature female, but she flushed the wrong direction and wasn't interested in our gerbils. The second bird we saw was sitting on a power pole. Rudy caught sight of her first. We got close to her and threw his trap out of the car. We headed down the road a ways while we waited and then spotted two other birds. Before we could get turned around however, the bird on the power pole came down to the trap, was that ever thrilling to watch! We pulled off and watched her foot the trap again and again for almost 5 minutes (those poor gerbils!). She just wasn't getting caught. Finally she started to jerk her foot erratically. We figured she had finally caught a loop. Thinking this was our chance we moved in and before we could reach her, she took off, knocking the trap over in the process.
Luckily, she landed nearby in a tree; she was keen on those gerbils. So, since she had fouled up (no pun intended) the other trap, I threw mine out there. I had spent about 8 hours building and setting loops on this trap, it had probably close to 150 loops on there. We drove down the road again and put Rudy's trap out on another young bird and by the time we turned around our first bird had nailed my trap! It was incredible! I grabbed a towel and ran over to her to restrain her... oh she was caught really good! She had at least 8 loops around her feet, she wasn’t going anywhere! We collected her, hooded her wrapped her in a towel and took her home!
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